Re: What has America lost?

"Don Swayser" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote

> Fallacious foundation for any kind of argument. Hussein ran a
> totalitarian state. Such states are very well informed about the state
> of presence of any non-citizens. I can only assume you're ignorant of
> the methods totalitarian states can employ to detect and track such
people.

What I'm really ignorant of is the information you use
to base the assertion that Saddam knew about some
al Qaeda dude getting medical treatment in Iraq... and
upon knowing, did *nothing* to stop it (gee!). Why
not share your source for that information so I can
also be similarly enlightened.

> Questionable. It seems to have been a no mans land, but I'm sure there
> are arguments on both sides.

You're sure?  Meaning... you... don't really know?

> However there has never been any reported
> armed clashes between Husseins armed forces and the terrorists. Since
> there were between the Kurds and them I'll leave it to the reader to
> decide the obviously apparent facts of the matter.

Sure -- any conflict with the Kurds is pro-Saddam!
Your grasp of geopolitical interactions is anything
but shallow!  ;)

> Non-sequiters won't be answered.

Non-answers will be noted and forwarded to your
mom.  :)

> Discredited by whom. You cite the ones which have been, by whom and
> provide substantiation. I know of none which have been discredited so I
> wouldn't know which ones to cite.

You haven't cited a believed-credible source on a
believed-credible claim. You've asserted and implied
a few things, but there's no sense in asking me to
chase your ghosts for you when you fail to provide
cites. An assertion without a cite is always suspect.

> For instance, was the meeting in
> Prague, reported by Czech intelligence discredited? By whom? How do they
> know? What is there proofs?

If you're referring to the spun-up leak of that Feith
memo, the DoD had this to say:

-- start DoD --

No. 851-03
IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 15, 2003
--------------------------------------------

DoD Statement on News Reports of al-Qaida and
Iraq Connections

News reports that the Defense Department recently
confirmed new information with respect to contacts
between al-Qaida and Iraq in a letter to the Senate
Intelligence Committee are inaccurate.

A letter was sent to the Senate Intelligence
Committee on October 27, 2003 from Douglas J. Feith,
Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, in response to
follow-up questions from his July 10 testimony. One of
the questions posed by the committee asked the
Department to provide the reports from the Intelligence
Community to which he referred in his testimony before
the Committee. These reports dealt with the relationship
between Iraq and al-Qaida.

The letter to the committee included a classified annex
containing a list and description of the requested reports,
so that the Committee could obtain the reports from
the relevant members of the Intelligence Community.

The items listed in the classified annex were either raw
reports or products of the CIA, the NSA, or, in one case,
the DIA. The provision of the classified annex to the
Intelligence Committee was cleared by other agencies
and done with the permission of the Intelligence
Community. The selection of the documents was made
by DOD to respond to the Committee's question. The
classified annex was not an analysis of the substantive
issue of the relationship between Iraq and al Qaida, and
it drew no conclusions.

Individuals who leak or purport to leak classified
information are doing serious harm to national security;
such activity is deplorable and may be illegal.

-- end DoD --

You have to admit, the DoD *ought* to be eager
to say that Mrssrs. Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld were
100% on-the-bling about that Saddam-loves-Osama
thing... but they ain't sayin' it.

> Before the war they struck targets throuout the world. The US and Bali,
> embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, the
> Philippines. Their only serious attack since the war was in Saudi
> Arabia.

So, it's unlikely to you that instead of killing
civilians all over the world, they're now streaming
into Iraq to kill U.S. troops instead?  That's what the
administration wanted us to believe a few weeks
ago, wasn't it?  Oh, and terrorism in Israel... let's
see THAT graph, too.  :-/

> You're an individual who seems incapable of recognizing obvious
> facts.

I'm really good at pointing out baseless assertions,
and lack of cites, though, so I'm not all bad.  :)

> I can only assume your mind is clouded from the truth by
> propaganda and indoctrination. Unless you can limit your rebuttals to
> cogent arguments and serious questions go away before you get me
irritated.

Hey, respond or don't. Your call, your nickel.

-- 
Toucan
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